Filed under: Music of the week
Again I am grouping two posts together.
The first artist is Alpha Blondy. This is someone I’ve not heard of before coming out to Africa on this trip, but whose music I have greatly enjoyed. Much of it is is french, although some is in english, but whichever language it is in it sounds fantastic. ALso he has done a french version of Bob Marleys ‘War’. AMong his other songs is superpowers, goree senegal and apartheid is nazsism. Many have a strong message, although even when in french and I can’t undersatand a word of the message I enjoy the music, and hop[e you will too.
The next artist is Papa Wemba. I don’t like all of his music, but there is one song in particvular I loove, ’show me the way’ and m,any others which are most enjoyable as well. He has also partnered with several other artists on different songs, and in my opinion these tend to be the best. Again I have only heard this music for the first time on this trip so don’t know muych about the background, but with the internet being what it is these days, I’m sure it’s not too difficult to find his music somewhere.
Filed under: Book of the Week
As the internet is so bad, I’m combining two post into one for book of the week.
The first is ‘Leopard’ by Cecil Bodker. This book was lent to me while out in Kenya, and one I had never heard of before. The story is set in Ethiopia and is about a sheperd boy who loses one of his flock to ‘the big one’ a leopard who is fearless and struck in severla villages before he strikes the boys herd. Out of fear for his herd, the boy leaves his home and searches for the wiseman in another village, leaving his family without a word but hoping to return with something that will keep the leopard away. As always, things don’t go quite to plan, and he ends up getting into a big adventure around the villages, almost losing his life on several occasions. I won’t say anymore as it will ruin the story, but it is well worth a read. It is quite an old book, so may be difficult to get hold of, but a look in a local library or on amaozn should have it somewhere.
The second book is ‘Africa, a biography of the continent’ I haven’t yet finsihed reading this, but it has come highly recommneded from many people, and what I have read of it is most interesting. It is a history of the continent from the very beginnings of time through to the modern world, and there are few if any other boks like it. For anyone interested in Africva and its history, it is an absoloute must. It si also quite easy to get hold of, being stocked in most good bookstores and if not stocked then very easy to order in.
Filed under: Diary
The next day we went to Hells Gate national park, just 10 kms from Fishermans camp. Driving through, the walls of the gorge rose up on either side of us and vultures nested in the cliff sides. They are the largest group of nesting vultures in Kneya I’m told, and each day they fly doiwn to the Maasai Mara to search for food before flying back to their nests in the cliffs. After passing them we went to Fischers tower, a lone standing rock some ten or twenty metres high. Here we watched rock hyraxes lazing out on the rocks sunbathing. Close to fischers rock, if you shout something, or sing something as they used to when they put operas on once a year in Hells Gate, it echoes several times off all the different rock faces – on a clear day you can hear at least five echoes and possibly more.
After Fischers tower we drove on to the obsidian caves, where we searched for hyenea cubs in the small caves and saw the decaying carcass of a hyenea just thirty yards from the caves, as well as some white throated beeaters, which had until after the recent rains been feared that they had left naivasha for good. The caves themselves are only small, but if in a car make an interesting 10 or 20 minute stop, and are really good if you are lucky enough to see hyena.
From there, we drove around hells gate admiring the wildlife, both mammals and birds. We didn’t see any predators, but we saw loads of zebra, hartebeest, girraffe, bufallo, gazelles and even a veluex eagle. Then we went up to the viewpoint to look out over the lake and the plains of hells gate national park, which is quite a stunning view, and form where one can see the house that one of Hemminways wives lived in.
After our the viewpoint, we went up to an area where the ground was really hot and steam came out of small holes, toasting your feet as you walked. From here we also managed to see some rhino in an adjoining private sancturay, as well as vultures descending to feast on a recently killed zebra carcass. Cloe to this, be3cause of all the geothermal activity and its taping to prioduce electricity, we found some hot springs and relaxed, bottle of tusker lager in hand, for about half and hour in the water. Although not very picteuresque becuase of all the metal piping around, the water is lovely and really good for your skin, so well worth doing, and a very pleasant way to finsih our day.
There is also a gorge that one can walk through in Hells gate, although which we didn’t do on that day. Again this is something well worth doing, and takes just a few hours. In the gorge there are natural hot springs, with both boiling and only tepid water, as well as, for the slightly fitter and more adventurous, tougher walks and climbs up and down more rocky parts of the gorge and through parts that have become overgrown through lack of vists. To get all of this done in a day requires a car and an early alarm call, but is well worth it. If you can’t get a car, you can go by bicycle, where you don’t get as much exploring, but which is nevertheless very enjoyable and in many ways nicer than the car becuase you are so much closer to everything you see.
Filed under: Diary
Two things to begin this post: one apologies for its lateness, problems with internet once gain and I had to help Isaac with a safair so couldn’t make it to the internet. Second, to explain who ‘we’ are in these posts. It is me, Isaac and Johan and Sheila, Isaacs first ever clients from seven years ago and godparents to his daughter, Impala. They hadbn’t seen him for seven years, so it was great to see them when they met up again and was a wonderful safari, which I was privalged and very greatful to have been on, as they are wonderful people and we had an amazing trip, whcijh I ntalk more about below
After a wonderful 24 hours in Amboseli, we returned to Naivasha to stay at Fisherman’s camp. This is a wonderful campsite right on the edge of the lake, with bandas at top camp where we stayed and a restaurant at bottom camp where hippos are visible grazing close by at night. It is always my base when I come to kenya, and I would highly recommend it top anyone visiting Naivasha – it is both good value in itself and also, if the restaurant is too expensive or you just want something more Kenyan, there is a very nice little village just fifty yards away with small cafes where one can eat three huge meals a day for about Kshs 200-300 (about 2 pounds sterling).
Back to the safari, we went for a trip on the lake to see the fish eagle swoop down to the water and seize his prey, a sight well worth seeing if you get the chance because it is huigely impressive. From there we continued to explore the lake, looking for snakes in the reeds and admiring the terrific variation and amount of birdlife the lake supports.
We were then dropped off on the lakeshore of crater lake game sanctuary. From there we walked through the beautiful sanctuary, again admiring the birdlife and also enjoying walking with a wonderful array of mammals, form the tall girraffe to the small dik diks with zebra, eland and impala, amongst others, in between.
After walking through the sancturay we went up to the view point and looked down into the crater, where the sloping saides are covered in forest and a small green lake sits peacefully in the centre. The crater is only small, but is is lovely to see, and the bar has a wonderful view over the lake, although food and drinks are a little pricey. Nevertheless, if one is in naivasha it is an absoloute must.
After eating, we went for a night game drive before heading back to fishermans camp for the night. I’m not a massive fan of night game drives as I don’t think you really see anything except eyes reflecting the spotlight, and the disturbance it causes is not worth the experience, in my opinion, although most people seem to disagree with me!
Having got back to fishermans, we went straight to sleep to rest up before entering the gates of hell the next day.
